A GENTLEMAN IN MOSCOW
Starring: Ewan McGregor, Mary Elizabeth Winstead, Fehinti Balogun, Daniel Cerqueira, Björn Hlynur Haraldsson, Johnny Harris, Leah Harvey, John Heffernan, Anastasia Hille, and Lyès Salem
Creator: Ben Vanstone
QUENTIN
A Gentleman in Moscow is essentially Steven Spielberg’s The Terminal stretched to eight hours and set against the backdrop of The Bolshevik Coup. Ewan McGregor does his best to keep things engaging, but the story is too drawn out, slowly paced, and oddly structured (holy time jump, Batman!) to hold one’s interest on a week-to-week basis. It also fails to fully explore the more interesting political turmoil happening outside the hotel-turned-makeshift-prison, instead focusing on the relationships and evolution of Alexander (McGregor) during his decades-long imprisonment at the luxurious Metropol. I suspect people of a certain age and disposition (read: your grandparents) may enjoy it, though.